Statement by Dr.
Nasser Al-Kidwa, Ambassador and Permanent Observer of Palestine to the United
Nations, before the Resumed Tenth Emergency Special Session of the General
Assembly on “Illegal Israeli Actions in Occupied East Jerusalem and the rest
of the Occupied Palestinian Territory, 19 September
2003:
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(Original Arabic - Check
against delivery)
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Mr. President,
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We are here today faced with the 26th
U.S. veto in
the Security Council specifically on the Palestinian question. We are faced with the decision by an
occupying Power “to remove” an elected leader of a people, without the
Security Council being able to take any action. We are faced with a
Member
State of the United Nations, whose
government is insane, violating the Charter of this international organization
and its resolutions day and night in blatant contempt and direct challenge of
the whole international community but with the support and protection of the
superpower. We are faced with the
most oppressive military campaign committed by an occupying Power against an
entire people, including the longest series of war crimes under the guise of
combating terrorism. We are faced
with the colonization of what remains of our Palestinian land that has
continued for more than 36 years, in what constitutes the biggest war crime in
modern history. This has
continued with verbal opposition from some and sincere opposition from others,
but without anyone being able to end it.Â
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Are we
going to do something to confront all of this? Will the international community find
the collective will - in the absence of the will of the superpower - to ensure
respect for international law and the resolutions of the United Nations and to
achieve the minimal degree of justice?Â
This is my deepest and most earnest hope. I can sincerely say, however, that our
Palestinian people, along with the millions of people in the region, have
begun to lose hope and to lose confidence in the usefulness of all of
this.
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Mr. President,
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We come today with the belief in the collective will of the Member
States united for peace. We come
to deal with the situation resulting from the inability of the Security
Council to fulfill its primary responsibility for the maintenance of
international peace and security due to the exercise of the veto by one of its
permanent members during the vote by the Council on the 16th of
this month on the draft resolution, which, inter alia, aimed at
preventing the Israeli threat to the safety of the President of the
Palestinian National Authority and thus, preventing the grave consequences
that might ensue. We express our
gratitude and appreciation to you, Mr. President, for your response to the
request by the Arab Group and
NAM to resume
the tenth emergency special session.Â
We also express our thanks and appreciation to all the countries who
will try with us to remedy what happened in the Security Council.
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Mr. President,
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On the 11th of this month, the threats of
Israel, the
occupying Power, against the Palestinian people and the Palestinian leadership
reached a new level with the decision by the so-called Israeli security
cabinet “to remove Yasser Arafat” and to request the Israeli army to draw up a
plan for his expulsion from his land and country. This was followed by statements by
Israeli officials, affirming that killing President Arafat was an actual
option, and other statements saying that the implementation of the cabinet’s
decision would not take place now but at a time to be determined by
Israel. We strongly condemn and reject all of
this as illegal and insane and consider it to be an assault on the Palestinian
national dignity and the democratic choice of our people.Â
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These
threats prove once again the intentions of the government of Mr. Sharon to
attack the Palestinian national leadership and to destroy it after exhausting
our people and destroying their socioeconomic condition. Any carrying out of the Israeli
threats would be considered a terrorist act and would lead to the end of the
Palestinian Authority and the actual demise of the peace process. We express our appreciation to most of
the nations of the world and its organizations for their firm and complete
condemnation of the Israeli threats and we call upon you to reaffirm this
today with the aim of preventing these threats and having them revoked.
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Mr. President,
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Indeed, Mr. Sharon and his government represent a threat to the
stability of the region. They reject real peace and insist on the use of force
and a military solution. Mr.
Sharon has publicly said, for those who want to hear, that he does not want a
lasting and permanent settlement and rather only seeks a long-term
transitional arrangement. The
vision of Mr. Sharon clearly is the imposition of a number of walled and
separate Bantustans, constricting the whole Palestinian
people on less that half of the West Bank and slightly
more than half of the Gaza Strip.Â
The Palestinians could find a way to connect these bantustans and call
it a Palestinian state if they wish while
Israel keeps
the rest of the Palestinian land and continues its colonization and gradual
annexation. We can add to all
that the rejection of dividing
Jerusalem between the two sides
and the rejection of any rights of
Palestine refugees.Â
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This is the
fact, and everything Mr. Sharon has said or done has been in line with such a
vision and in its service. That
is why the expansionist wall is being built- to wall the above-mentioned
bantustans and to terminate any potential for a real settlement. That is also
why settlement activities are continuing, including the illegal transfer of
Israeli settlers to our land. And
that is why
Israel
continues with its military escalation and destruction and why it has worked
so vigorously to reverse the situation to pre-Oslo conditions ten years after
its beginning.Â
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But
achieving such a racist and dreadful vision requires two main things. The first is breaking down the
Palestinian national movement and the destruction of its leadership, since it
would never accept such schemes.Â
That is why we see such a vicious campaign against Yasser Arafat, the
national leader of our people, and the attempts to get rid of him.
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The second
thing is the undermining of international legitimacy and the disappearance of
relative United Nations resolutions - all coupled with the intensive efforts
to destroy any real international initiatives to salvage the situation. That is why the Mitchell
recommendations were destroyed and buried and that is why the Road Map was
emptied of its contents on the way to burial.
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Mr. President,
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This political position comes against the backdrop of the bloody
Israeli military campaign against our people, which has continued now for
nearly three years. During this
time, it has inflicted horrific human and material losses among our people to
the extent that the humanitarian situation has deteriorated to a catastrophic
level. Throughout this campaign,
the Israeli occupying forces have committed actions that are prohibited under
The Hague Regulations, the Fourth Geneva Convention and Additional Protocol 1,
including innumerable war crimes. They have committed acts of willful killing,
including extrajudicial executions, committed wanton destruction of property,
imposed collective punishments and committed extensive destruction of
infrastructure and homes and prevented the freedom of movement of humanitarian
organizations, including United Nations agencies, and emergency rescue
personnel, including ambulances. They uprooted and razed thousands of dunums
of agricultural land, including harvests and trees, and imposed a siege and
closure on all population centers.Â
As they have committed all of the above, the occupying forces have used
all types of heavy weaponry, including war planes, helicopters and tanks.
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Mr. President,
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The High Contracting Parties to the Fourth Geneva Convention and the
parties to the Rome Statue of the International Criminal Court have a clear
responsibility with regard to those who commit war crimes. We call on those countries to issue
indictments and to bring to justice those Israelis that have committed war
crimes against the Palestinian people.Â
Foremost among these individuals are General Shaul Mofaz, the Chief of
Staff of the Israeli army and the current Defense Minister, and General Moshe
Ya’alon, the current Chief of Staff, and all the commanders of the Israeli
military units that have committed war crimes. Throughout the years many crimes and
massacres have been committed against the Palestinian people from Deir Yassin
to Kafr Qassem and Khan Yunis and also those that have been directly linked
with an individual named Ariel Sharon - Colonel Sharon in the massacre of
Qibya and Defense Minister Sharon in the massacre in Sabra and Shatilla and
Prime Minister Sharon in the massacre in the Jenin refugee camp. The international community must
ensure that such crimes and massacres are not repeated.
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Mr. President,
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As if crimes are not enough, the Israeli government is trying to depict
what has happened and is happening as if it is about a battle against
terrorism. What is painful is
that some have accepted this and even accepted the hijacking by
Israel of the
agenda to combat international terrorism and to deviate it in the direction of
an open war against the Arabs and Muslims to serve its narrow political
interests. It seems that those
have also forgotten that Israel was the first to introduce terrorism to our
region, from the assassination of U.N. mediator Count Bernadotte, to the
massacres against our people, to the sinking of the USS Liberty, to the
downing of a civilian Libyan airplane, to the bombardment of Arab civilian
targets such as the Beirut airport, Bahr al-Baqar school in Egypt and most of
Quneitra in the Occupied Syrian Golan, to the assassination of many
Palestinian leaders and cadres in Beirut, Tunis and Europe, to the deliberate
bombardment of the U.N. building in Qana in Southern Lebanon, to the threat to
the safety and freedom of the elected Palestinian President. The list is too long and time too
limited to go further.
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In all cases, we are all against terrorism and on our part we have been
very clear in our condemnation of actions committed by Palestinian groups in
contravention of international law, specifically the suicide bombings that
have targeted civilians in
Israel. Moreover, we have constantly stated
that these do not serve the national interest of the Palestinian people or the
realization of their goals. But
matters do not begin or end here.Â
The main issue is the Israeli occupation of our land and the settler
colonialism of this land and the rejection by
Israel of our
right to the State of Palestine and its national independence. Why don’t the Israelis get out of our
land and then they can build all the walls they want on international borders?
Why don’t they at least stop the colonization of our land and the illegal
transfer of colonial settlers to it?Â
It is important to mention that the first suicide bombing occurred 27
years after the onset of the occupation and after
Israel had
actually transferred at least 350,000 colonial settlers to the
Occupied
Territory and settled them in more
than two hundred settlements and after it had declared the annexation of
Jerusalem. Indeed, all of this was done before
and not in reaction to any of the suicide bombings.
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Why are the Israelis even after the beginning of the bombings
committing all this killing and destruction and committing such war
crimes? Does this benefit the
battle against suicide bombings?Â
And, why has
Israel
committed all of this systematic oppression and committed all of the crimes it
did before that and for more than a quarter of a century? What our people do not understand also
is the readiness of some to so quickly and enthusiastically condemn the
suicide bombings, which kill Israeli civilians, but would not condemn the war
plane bombings or the tank shelling, which kill Palestinian civilians in even
greater numbers, at least not with the same quickness and enthusiasm. This is not right, legally or
morally. In all cases, these
bombings must cease, but also Israeli war crimes and all other types of
violence must cease on the way to ending the occupation. This is the key to everything. If this occupation continues, the
Israeli violence and crimes and violations will continue to maintain the
occupation and, in turn, the Palestinian violence will continue, whether the
legal resistance against the occupation or whether the illegal actions, such
as suicide bombings in
Israel.
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This is not
our option. There should be a complete cessation of violence and the logic of
military solutions.  We must
rely on the political solution that restores hope and we must return to the
negotiating table. This is our
option and we are saying here also that the Road Map should be revived and
implemented in a real and honest way.Â
But, for this to happen, we cannot continue the old way. It is high time to admit that the
essential problem is the position of
Israel,
insisting on colonization and rejecting putting an end to the occupation of
the Palestinian land and failing to accept an independent sovereign State of
Palestine with East Jerusalem as its capital. Without changing that, there is no
peace process and there could be no implementation of the Road Map or any
other initiative. Such change in
turn, when it takes place, will open the road to the implementation by the
Palestinian side of its obligations, including the cessation of all violence
and the provision of real security.Â
It is high time to face reality and to stop covering the Israeli
positions or running away from confronting those positions while hoping that
the process will remain alive, even if in appearance only. It is high time to stop inventing
other reasons for the current crisis, such as the internal Palestinian
situation or other issues despite their importance.Â
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Mr. President,
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The revival of the Road Map will require new and serious implementation
beginning with the very first step, coupled with the decision to face up to
the realities and prevent both sides from evading their responsibilities. The Security Council could – and
indeed, should - play an important role in this respect. It must provide strong support for the
Road Map and officially order the two sides to comply with its provisions and
to implement them. We must also,
through the Quartet and perhaps also with the help of the Security Council,
build the agreed-upon monitoring mechanism and have a real international
presence – maybe even international troops. Such bold steps are required if
the current tragic situation is to be brought to an end and a return to the
path of peace is to be ensured.
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Mr. President,
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At this
time, it is incumbent on the international community and on us here at the
tenth emergency special session of the General Assembly to take the necessary
measures to prevent the looming combustion of the situation and to ensure that
no harm will be inflicted on our President. Once more, this needs to be
undertaken in compliance with international law and in respect for the
national dignity of our people and their democratic choices and finally in
preservation of the option of peace.Â
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Thank you, President.